Area Manager - West NL at Wakuli in Leiden, South Holland, NL

Join us to lead our store managers & grow our impact

About Wakuli We love great coffee. That’s why we’re building an alternative coffee industry that actually works, for both farmers and consumers. How? By working directly with farmer groups around the world. We set up transparent, traceable export lines, roast the beans ourselves and sell the coffee straight to customers. So no unnecessary middlemen or resellers. Those short supply chains make sure farmers always get a good price.

You’ll find us in 26 (and counting) bars across the Netherlands, and online through our own platform. For customers, that means freshly roasted specialty coffee that’s easy to access, relatively affordable and just seriously delicious. We are building the new coffee brand of the 21st century with a team of like-minded innovators from all over the world. And we’re looking for you.

We’re looking for a strong, driven Area Manager to lead our Store Managers across West NL. You’ll raise the standard in every store and help build a store operating model that works the same way in every new city we open in.

You lead leaders. You coach Store Managers to own their stores’ results, spot what’s working and spread it, and you’re accountable for the performance of your region.

What you’ll do

You’re responsible for all Wakuli stores in West NL and the Multi Store Managers who run them, with their Team Leads and barista teams behind them. Today the region covers Rotterdam, Leiden and Den Haag. Your region will grow through 2027 as we open new stores, so the team you lead in December will be bigger than the one you start with.

Your role is hands on and in the stores. You spend 90% of your time on the ground in your region, coaching, challenging and supporting your SMs to make each store better each week. You’re in the stores to lead, share feedback and support the growth of our team and our impact, not to cover shifts.

This means:

Leadership and team development

• You coach your Store Managers with clarity and structure, helping them find their own answers rather than handing them yours
• You run regular performance conversations and 1:1s, and you hold the standard consistently across stores
• You plan for succession in every store. You develop Team Leads into future SMs and grow brand ambassadors in every team, and you use our pay grades and training progression to give people a clear path
• You support hiring for key roles, and make sure onboarding sets every new starter up well
• You create a culture people want to be part of, and stay in: fair, ambitious and energised

Growing your region We’re opening 12 new stores across the Netherlands in 2027, several of them in West NL. Your region, and your team, will grow through the year.

• You build the team for every new store: you hire the Store Manager ahead of opening and make sure the whole team is trained and ready before the doors open
• You support each new store through its ramp-up, and you act fast if one falls behind
• You keep your existing stores performing while their people help open new ones
• You plan ahead with our Openings Manager, so your region’s growth never takes you by surprise
• You help build and test the playbooks and toolkit we use every time we open a store

Performance and growth

• You own the results you can steer: wage cost against budget, stores open and running on time, store standards and team health. Together with Marketing and Product you drive revenue, making sure every campaign and range lands in every store
• You use the store health dashboard with your SMs to steer on the drivers that grow a store: footfall, CPG sales, loyalty and food revenue
• You manage labour smartly: wage cost on budget, and hours and payroll right first time
• You turn data into action. You find the gaps between stores and close them by copying what the best stores do
• You make every store part of its neighbourhood, with regular community activity in every store

Working across Wakuli

• You work closely with our Marketing Team to deliver our campaigns impactfully in our stores
• You share best practice with the other Area Managers and the wider Store Management Team

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What we’re looking for

This is a role for someone who’s led managers, not only teams. You know how to get results through other people, and how to grow people while you do it.

You bring:

• 8+ years of experience in hospitality or retail, including 3+ years in multi-site management
• A track record of coaching managers to own their results
• Confidence with numbers. You can read a P&L, a labour report and a dashboard, and you know what to do next
• Strong operational instincts and a sharp sense of ownership, structure and service quality
• Fluency in English (Dutch is a strong plus)
• Availability of 38 hours/week, flexible across the week, including weekends when the region needs it
• Willingness to travel across your region every week

What we offer

• A key role in a fast-scaling impact company
• A steep learning curve and plenty of growth opportunities. We’re opening 12 more stores in 2027, which comes with lots of opportunities
• A team of 170+ impact-driven colleagues from 30+ countries
• Direct access to our coffee producers and full coffee value chain
• Monthly salary between €3,450 and €3,600 (based on 38 hours)
• Naturally all travel expenses are covered
• And of course, unlimited coffee

Our culture

We lead with purpose. We are direct, but kind. We give feedback to help each other grow. We make mistakes, but we own them. We move fast, but we don’t move alone.

We live by three principles:

• We make each other better
• We sharpen our focus
• We keep pace as one team

If that sounds like you, we’d love to meet. Let’s start with a cup of coffee!